Stardust Contenders Pitch: First contact as a sports movie - mankind is invited to send a delegation to an interstellar Olympics just 5 years after making contact, and so must send a delegation equally adroit at diplomacy, anthropology, game theory and athletics to represent them. Its inspirations are a hybrid of Mass Effect and Cool Runnings, with a dash of The Player of Games. Intro: It has been five years since mankind first made contact with sentient alien life. We knew that the universe was going to run out of energy; what we didn't know was how close it was to happening. The various alien species had come up with some true power generators capable of introducing new energy into the universe, but lacked the real means to implement it. These new generators required a tremendous amount of bodies to be in an emotionally excited states in a locally concentrated area. They had tried to find ways to power the great device, all to no avail. Humanity had the solution: The Fan. There was no one more ravenous, more extreme of emotion, than a Fan in support of their Team. Using the example of the ancient Grecian Olympics, a plan was made: begin construction of a suitably large Stadium, and the Excitement Generator around it, to keep the lights on the universe. There would be five years to prepare while they were being built. Humanity began exporting media promoters like smallpox, creating Fans for things never even thought possible. It was more effective than the promoters could ever conceive. The Fans they had created were more than anything they had seen in Humanity, potentially due to the centuries of knowing the collapse of everything was upon them, and a new hope given to them. It has been five years since mankind first made contact with sentient alien life. Soon, the first games will begin. Humanity has sent its best teams, its most capable fans, and the support squads required to ensure the Universe keeps moving. Game Setup: To play Stardust Contenders, you'll need: - At least two friends willing to spend 4 hours on this. One of you will be the GM, the rest will be players. - Some six-sided dice. - A bunch of index cards. Humans Before Contact, people were just... people. Only having someone to compare ourselves showed us how special we were. Take the first index card and write 'Humanity' on it. Write down what's special about humanity, newly revealed in comparison to other races. This is humanity's trait, usable by all characters. Humanity has the Athletics, Culture and Politics tracks at 0, representing their interstellar reputation in those fields. Aliens Though now, there's far more people in the galaxy than just humans. Put out an index card for each player - one for each alien culture. Going around the table, suggest: - Two distinguishing features. - A possible but unverified weakness. - Why they disdain humanity. - Why they're curious about humanity. - A name. Write these down, and repeat for each culture. Teams: Each player takes a card and writes their team's name and concept down on it. Choose a team type: - Sports - The brave men and women who get together on the field to actually play the game, whatever it is. - Stands - The reason we're here today. A collection of Fans and the Professionals that help keep them alive. - Support - The water boys and medics and collective sideline support. Provides backup for both Sports and Stands teams, as needed. While there are several types of teams, each team is still made of Combatants. While there are many people on a team, there are only a few who are notable. Choose three: - The Ace - The point man, the cornerstone of the team. - Extremely skilled. Gets 3 points to spend towards attributes. No attribute can be greater than 4. - Friends with Second Runner. Enemies with The Totally a Human. - The Buddy - He's what keeps the team together. - Especially smooth talker, people are willing to give him a second chance. - In any social interaction to smooth things over or reduce tension, this combatant may choose to roll a second time and take the higher result. This may happen even after a failed interaction. The first time this ability is used, it is free to use. Every time after that, roll d6 and roll under 7-times used previously. (Second time, 5-1; Third time, 4-1, et cetera) - Authority figures may find this character suspicious if this ability is used too often. - Chummy with everyone, enemies with no one. Gains no other benefits of Friendship. - The Wizard - "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke. Might actually be a wizard. - Can put something together in a stitch. - Capable of performing field repairs on any equipment brought in without penalties. - The equipment so fixed is jury rigged and might not last; every time it needs to be used, roll a d6. It breaks on a 6, and is unrepairable until it can be taken off of the field. - Friends with the Cheese Man. Enemies with the Connections Man. - The Totally a Human - Is definitely a human guys. - Is actually an alien from among those competing. Can be used to mitigate a disadvantage from playing a sport that requires something humans do not have. - Every time this ability is used, if something is not done to ensure that this combatant is Totally Human, a conflict occurs. - Friends with the Connections Man, Enemies with the Ace. - The Second Runner - Was really really good at something before. Thought they would be really great at this new thing as well. Able to get signed because of former notoriety, but are not really that good. - Very strong in one thing. Choose an activity. Any roll used for that activity gets a +2. All other rolls get -1. - Friends with the Ace, Enemies with the Cheese Man. - The Connections Man - Knows where to get that weird thing you need in order for you to pass the alien pee test. Or to pee clean for that thing you accidently took last weekend. - Has a 50% chance to know a guy who can get you the thing. Any time you need to get ahold of something or someone, roll d6. On a 4+, you already know a guy and can get in touch in no time. - Friends with the Totally a Human. Enemies with the Wizard. - The Cheese Man - Finds weird loopholes in weirder things. It turns out, you can pass backwards, but only if the player being passed to and passing are the same player. "Players are defined by shirt numbers!" - Oddly esoteric knowledge of the rules. Seriously. How do they know all this stuff? - Can have awareness of a strange rule combination. Choose two rules in the current game being played, and come up with an interaction between the two of them. This causes a success (automatically if the conditions have already occurred, or roll if you need to do something more). This ability can only be used once per combination of rules. - Friendswith the Wizard. Enemies with the Second Runner. Combatants in Stardust Contenders have the following stats: - Speed: Moving quickly and precisely. - Brawn: Strength, endurance and toughness. - Tactics: Quick thinking, strategy and leadership. - Physiology: Diagnosing, healing and augmenting humans. - Astrophysics: Interstellar travel, spatial anomalies and theoretical physics. - Xenology: Alien cultures, beliefs and physiologies. - Presence: Raw charisma, being the centre of attention. - Socialise: Subtly/indirectly exerting social pressure. - Empathy: Understanding other's goals and weaknesses. Each combatant chooses one as their defining skill (rating 3). No two combatants can have the same defining skill while on the same team. Give three other skills a rating of 2, and set the rest at 1. Finally, put together your intro montage: an introduction to your character's background and motivations. It has three sections: - What background did your character come from? - What defining moment made them famous? - What secret flaw or obligation are they struggling with? Describe your intro to the table and sum up each point as a 2-5 word phrase; these are your starting traits. Doing Stuff: To do something roll take a number of dice equal to your skill. Decide if you're boosting this with traits - unless they're humanity’s traits put an x next to them to remind you they're used up. Roll skill ()d6, take the highest, and add +1 for each trait used. Succeed on a 5+. The Event: Our translators are still imperfect, and may have only a basic schedule to give you. You'll have to work out the details once you're on the ground. While the event is a madhouse brawl from start to finish (if such a thing will ever come to pass), there is a pre-established schedule that will generally be followed. Build up the Games' schedule. Start with these cards: - The Opening and Closing Ceremonies - 1 game for each race (including humanity) Each player also picks two of these to add in: - Diplomatic summit - Formal gala - Bar crawl - Media interviews - Art exhibition - Trade fair - Planetary safari Put the Opening and Closing ceremonies at opposite ends of a line and shuffle and deal out the other cards between them. Split them into three groups, as equal as you can make them. These'll be the three weeks of the Games. Playing The game starts at the beginning of the first week - you've just arrived at the planet or space station the games are being hosted on, found your quarters and unpacked. Each week is broken into two phases: preparation and play. Preparation Each player gets two actions, picked from the following list. Research You investigate an upcoming event. Roll an appropriate skill. - Success: the GM explains what it involves and what your team can do to get +1 to a reputation track. - Failure: as success, but the GM will also say one crucial element humans are unsuited for. Prepare You train or put together resources for an upcoming event. Roll an appropriate skill for what you're doing - normally Physiology, Tactics or Socialise. - Success: you (or a teammate) gain a one-use trait to use in that event. - Failure: you gain the trait but exhaust yourself - mark off one of your traits. Ally You try to get one of the aliens on-side to help you out. Say what sort of ally you're looking for and roll an appropriate skill: - Success: they'll promote you (+1 to one of the three tracks) if you do something for them in one of this week's events. - Failure: They'll warn you not to do something in one of this week's events; if you do it, you'll take -1 reputation in one track. Rest Take a break to refresh all your traits. Events Once preparation is over you run through the week's schedule, following these steps for every event: 1) Make a plan The GM will tell you if this event is mainly Athletic, Political or Cultural. Put together a plan, deciding who'll be the main playmaker and what others are doing to try and assist them. 2) Set-up Everyone assisting in the plan describes their action and rolls an appropriate skill: - Success: you do your part, giving the main actor +1 dice to their roll. - Failure: you fumble; give the main actor -1 to their roll. 3) Follow-through The main actor makes their roll, modified by set-up. Get -1 to this if the team wasn't able to research the event. - Success: the plan works! Take +1 to this event's relationship track. - Failure: the plan's not enough. Choose: accept the loss, or push it to gain victory - get +1 to this event's track but take -1 to another. The GM describes the outcome of the event, and you move to the next one. Wrapping Up At the end of the Closing Ceremony, assess your tracks. For every point above 0, a player can describe one positive result for humanity as a result of the games. For each point below 0, the GM describes one negative outcome as a result of the team's actions. Example: the team ends with Athletics +3, Culture +2, Politics -1, so gets 5 positive outcomes and 1 negative. Finally, wrap up with a description of each character's li